ACG Blog

How to treat nonresident aliens for qualified retirement plan purposes is often misunderstood. Are nonresident aliens allowed to participate in U.S. plans? Do you have to cover them? And what is a nonresident alien anyway?

If you were to receive a notice from the Social Security Administration saying you might be owed some money from a long-ago former employer’s retirement plan, you would probably think, “Cool. I’m owed some money from a long-ago former employer’s reti...

You can’t have the TV on very long before one of those ads for the latest prescription drug comes on. “Ask your doctor whether Incredipill is right for you.” Why would a commercial tell me to ask my doctor about a drug? If the medicine is right for m...

Did your parents or a teacher ever threaten you with dire consequences in order to correct an undesirable behavior? “If you cross your eyes, they’ll get stuck that way.” “Young man, this will go on your permanent record!”

Right now, I am loving me some IRS. The agency everyone loves to hate each April 15 has been on quite a roll lately with some really great news for those of us in the 401(k) and pension world. Here’s what they’ve done this year:

Mutual funds. ETFs. Treasury notes. Stocks. Bonds. All of these are investments commonly found inside qualified retirement plans. How about real estate? Is that permitted? I am not talking about REITs or a real estate mutual fund. I mean, can a retir...

There is some confusion in Retirement Plan Land about who needs to file Form 5500-EZ and who doesn’t, according to an IRS compliance project. Some plan sponsors are turning to the wrong people for advice, not reading the form’s instructions, or both.

UPDATE: The Treasury and the IRS announced on April 14 that the proposed rules we wrote about below are being withdrawn at this time. Yay! We will post a separate article about the withdrawal of these proposed regulations in the coming weeks.

When you first think about it, the idea of a Simplified Employee Pension (SEP) plan seems appealing. Qualified retirement plans like 401(k)s can be complicated and confusing. With a SEP, you don’t need to hire a Third Party Administrator, there are n...

I am registered to attend the national Enrolled Actuaries Meeting in April. I have missed this annual conference only once since 1997. Unfortunately, a friend that has been there with me every time will not be joining me this year and may never again...